The first event of the 2015 Heroes of Cards seasn offered few upsets as the tournament is down to a very promising top eight.
With much of community's attention going towards the ESL Legendary grand finals, Heroes of Cards' debut got somewhat left in the shadows, though not for the lack of big names. The 16-man tournament gave start to the year-long circuit that's planned to have a total of $40,000 in prizes and travel support, ending with a big LAN event later this year. The player pool of the opening event had pretty much everything a fan could want in a Hearthstone tournament: there were big names, big streamers and up-and-comers showing promise in their recent appearances.
The results of the first day heavily favored the household names of Hearthstone. In the opening match, Cloud 9 captain Marcin "Gnimsh" Filipowicz added another loss to his recent records, losing to Nihilum's marquee Thijs "ThijsNL" Moledijk. Though it wasn't a one-sided series by any means, it prolonged Gnimsh's struggles to clean up his win-rate as the Pole has been hovering below 29% ever since he finished second in the second Millenium Cup.
Thijs was soon joined by more pillars of European Hearthstone, including GosuAwards player of the year Aleksandr "Kolento" Malsh, 2014 summer sensation Dima "Rdu" Radu and Pinnacle 2 runner-up Adrian "Lifecoach" Koy, the latter making for the flawless Nihilum record in day one. Northern Europe also came in swinging hard, well-represented by SK's Filip "Numberguy" Samuelsen and the Fnatic duo of Jökull "Kaldi" Jóhannsson and Bertil "Frezzar" Fall.
The only non-European who managed to squeeze by the first round was former Archon player Raphael "Hosty" Tsantili. The Canadian, who only recently found himself in the middle of a cheating controversy, made a step towards clearing his name, defeating James "Greensheep" Luo in a five-game battle.
The show continues today with the following matches:
More on GosuGamers Hearthstone:
